The Iola register. [volume] (Iola, Allen County, Kansas) 1875-1902, 1887-08-19
APPALLING DISASTER.
a Niagara Excursion Train Plun9es
Through q Burning Bridge in
Illinois.
Hundreds of Persons Killed and In.
jured Untold Horrors The
Wreck on Fire.
Partial List of the Dead and Wounded
Awful Scenes Houses Filled With
Sufferers.

CHICAGO, Aug IA Niagara Falls ex-
Uursion train on the Toledo Peoria a.
Western railway, consisting Of seventeen
coaches and sleepers, crowded with passen-
gers from Peoria and points along the line,
was wrecked two and oue-half miles from
Chatsworth, about one a. m. yester-
day, BY running into a burning cul-
vert The two engines were CON-
pletely wrecked, together with ten
coaches and the baggage car, and over 100
lives lost and several hundred persons
MANNED. Engineer McClintock was in
stantly killed. but the two firemen and the
other engineer escaped serious injury. The
ten cars were piled on top Of the two en-
gines, being telescoped and piled across and
On top Of each other. 1t is miraculous how
many escaped, as the coaches and engines
do not occupy over two car lengths of track
and all on top Of the roadbed. In one
coach not person escaped, and in
mother but one, lady. Seventy dead
were taken out up to noon and 100 wounded
have been brought and put in the town
hall, school house, depot, etc. The cars
canght fire, but it was put out by trainmen
and passengers. A heavy rain set in about
two hours after the wreck, before the
wounded could be taken away, continuing
Tor two hours.
NEWSPAPER ACCOUNT.
CHICAGO, Aug. 12.-Thc Timer account of
the awful railroad disaster near Chats
worth is as follows: All railway horrors
in the history of this country we're sur
passed three miles east of Chatsworth last
night when an excursion train on the To-
ledO, Peoria & Western road dropped
through burning bridge and over one hun
H. L. III
cumber more or less badly injured. The
train was composed Of six sleeping cars, day
coaches and chair cars and three baggage.
It was carrying $50 passengers, all ex-
cursonists, and was bound for Niagara
Falls The train had been made up all
along the line of the Toledo. Peoria Il
Western road and the excursionists hailed
from various points in Central Illinois, the
bulk of them, however, coming from
Peoria. Some of the passengers came
from Canton, from Ell Paso. Washington
and in fact all stations along the line; some
from as far west as Burlington and Keokuk,
Ia A special and cheap rate had been
made for the excursion and all sorts of
people took advantage Of it.
When the train drew out of Peoria at
eight o'clock Wednesday evening it was
loaded to its utmost capacity, every berth
In the siv sleeper+ being taken and the day
tara carry ing sixty people each. The train
WAS 50 heavy that two engines were hitched
10 it, and when it passed this place it was
&n hour and a half behind time. Chats
worth, the next station cast of here, is six
miles OF, and the run there was made in
seven minutes, so the terrible momentum
of those fifteen coaches and two heavy en-
gines shooting through space at the
rate of a mile minute can be understood.
N. stop was made at Chatsworth and on
and on the heavy train with its living
freight sped through the darkness of the
night. Three miles east Of Chatsworth is a
little slough and where the railroad track
crosses a dry run about ten feet deep and
fifteen wide. Over this was stretched
an ordinary wooden trestle bridge,
and as the excursion train came thunder
ing down ON it, what was the horror
OF the engineer on the front engine
when he saw that this bridge was afire.
Right up before his eyes leaped the bright
flames and the next instant he was among
them. There was no chance to stop. Had
there Deen warning, it would have taken
half mile to stop that onrushing mass of
wood, iron and human life and the train
was within one hundred yards of the red
messenger of death before they flashed
their fatal signals into the engineers face.
But he passed over in safety, the first en-
Ginc keeping the rails. AS it went over
the bridge fell beneath it and it could only
have been the terrible speed of the train
which saved the lives of the engineer and
his fireman.
But the next engine went down, and in
stantly the deed of death was done. Car
smashed into car, seats piled one on top of
another, and in the twinkling of an eye
nearly one hundred persons found instant
death and fifty more were so hurt that they
could not live. As for the wounded, they
were everywhere. Only the sleeping coaches
escaped, and as the startled and half
dressed passengers came tumbling out of
them they found such q scene of death as is
rarely witnessed, and such work to do that
it seemed as if human hands were utterly
incapable. 1t lacked but five minutes Of
midnight.
Down IN the ditch lay the second engine,
Engineer McCliutock dead and Fireman Ap-
plegate badly injured. On top were piled
the three baggage cars, one on top of an
other, like a child's cardhouse after he had
swept it with his hand. Then came the six
day coaches-they were telescoped as cars
never were before, and three Of them were |
pressed into JUS: space enough for one |
crashed through the Car ahead of it, |
crushing the woodwork aside like finder, |
and lay there resting on the top Of |
the seats, while every passenger in the |
front car was lying dead and dying under |
meath. Out Of that car but four people |
came alive. On top of the second car lay |
the third. and although the latter did not |
cover its bearer as completely as the one |
its bottom was smeared with the |
blood Of its victims. The other three cars |
were not so badly crushed, but they were
broken and twisted in every conceivable /
way, and every crushed timber and beam
crushed human frame and q
broken bone.
Instantly the air was filled with the cries
Of the wounded and the shrieks of those
about to ole. The groans Of men, the
screams Of the women united to make a
sound, and above all could be
heard the agonizing cries Of little children
rs in some instances they lay pinned beside
their dead parents.
After a desperate fight to subdue the
flames which broke out in the wreck, help
came from Chatsworth, Forest and Piper
City, and as the dead were laid reverently
alongside OF each other, out in the corn
field, there were ready hands to take them
into Chatsworth, while some of the wound
ed were carried to Piper City, One hun
bred and eighteen was the awful poll Of the
dead, while the wounded numbered four
times that number. The full tale Of the
dead can not, however, be told yet for
lays.
Chatsworth was turned into morgue.
The town hall, the engine house, the depot
we're all full Of dead bodies, while every
house in the little village had its quota of
The wounded. There was over 100 corpses
lying in the extemporized dead houses, and